James Astill

James Astill is the Washington Correspondent of The Economist. He was formerly the Energy and Environment Editor, leading the magazine’s coverage of climate change, oceans and forests. In 2010 he wrote a special report on the world’s forests, researched in Indonesia, Uganda, India, Mexico and Brazil, that won the Grantham Prize for Excellence in Reporting on the Environment. He retains a strong interest in global forest issues, about which he continues to write and speak widely. He has also worked as The Economist’s Political Editor and Bagehot Columnist, South Asia Bureau Chief, International Security Editor, Afghanistan & Pakistan Correspondent, and Africa Correspondent. He has won several major awards for journalism, including the Gerald Ford Prize for Reporting on US Security, and for his best-selling book ‘The Great Tamasha : Cricket, Corruption and the Turbulent Rise of Modern India’. He was educated at the universities of Oxford and Tokyo and lives in Washington, DC.